Method and system for payment and/or issuance of credits via a mobile device

ABSTRACT

System and method for delivering upon request credits having monetary value to a mobile device using a communications network. An account of available credit for the user of the mobile device is maintained and authorization to issue credit is generated when a request for credit for the mobile device is received and there is available credit in the account associated with the mobile device equal to or greater than the requested credit. Credit may be sponsored by one or more sponsors and issued to the user, upon authorization, to enable the user to use the mobile device to purchase items, e.g., at a point of sale terminal.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/157,099filed Jun. 6, 2008, which claims priority from UK Application GB0803468.8 filed Feb. 26, 2008 and from U.S. Provisional PatentApplication No. 60/934,227 filed Jun. 12, 2007, the entire contents ofeach of which is incorporated herein by reference.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates generally to methods and systems forpayment of goods and services, and the issuance of credits toward thepayment of goods and services, via a mobile device.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Usage of cellular or mobile telephones is very popular and common. In atypical arrangement for use of a mobile telephone, a user subscribes toa mobile telephone service offered by a mobile telephone operator orcarrier and enters into a pre-paid or post-paid plan with the mobiletelephone operator. A pre-paid subscription plan is usually anarrangement where the user pays in advance for the telephone services tobe used over a future period of time. A post-paid subscription plan isusually an arrangement where the user pays for the telephone servicesafter using the services.

The services available using the mobile telephone may be voice services(i.e., making and receiving telephone calls), messaging services such asShort Message Service (SMS), Multimedia Message Service (MMS), dataservices such as Internet browsing or Wireless Application Protocol(WAP) browsing, video calls, downloading content, streaming content,purchasing applications such as games or other software, using location,guidance or navigation services, finding information, and communicatingwith a group of people and others.

Mobile telephones can also be used as a payment method in point of salestransactions. One example of such usage involves use of the near fieldcommunication (NFC) capabilities of a mobile telephone to use it ascredit card in the point of sales transaction.

On the other hand, instead of being used to pay for goods and services,a mobile telephone can receive coupons for discounts which may be usedin a point of sales transactions conducted using the mobile telephone orotherwise, and free samples which may be received using the mobiletelephone or otherwise. In this regard, reference is made toInternational Publication No. WO 2007/060451, incorporated by referenceherein in its entirety.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention is directed at least in part to a method andsystem for providing credits, vouchers or coupons representative ofmonetary value to users of mobile devices such as mobile telephones. Theusers of the mobile telephones are able to use the monetary value of thecredits to purchase goods and/or services.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The invention, together with further objects and advantages thereof, maybest be understood by reference to the following description taken inconjunction with the accompanying drawings, wherein like referencenumerals identify like elements, and wherein:

FIG. 1 is a schematic of an exemplifying architecture of a firstembodiment of a credit delivery system in accordance with the invention.

FIG. 2 is a schematic of an exemplifying architecture of a secondembodiment of a credit delivery system in accordance with the invention.

FIG. 3 is a schematic of an exemplifying architecture of a thirdembodiment of a credit delivery system in accordance with the invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

Referring to the accompanying drawings wherein the same referencenumerals refer to the same or similar elements, FIG. 1 shows anarchitecture of an embodiment of a mobile payment system in accordancewith the invention which is designated generally as 10.

System 10 may be implemented to provide credits having monetary value tomobile devices 12 (only one of which is shown in FIG. 1) and thus can beconsidered to be independent of the mobile devices 12, i.e., not includethe mobile devices. On the other hand, the invention also encompasses asystem for enabling users of mobile devices 12 to receive credits havingmonetary value which would be inclusive of the mobile devices. In thelatter case, the users may be required to view advertisements inexchange for the credits.

The mobile devices 12 may be any form of mobile terminal such as amobile telephone, a multimedia computer, a personal digital assistant(PDA), a laptop computer or a personal computer.

Mobile devices 12 are arranged to use a communications network 14 tocommunicate with other elements of the system 10 described below.Communications network 14 can utilize any cellular network technologieswhich include, but are not limited to, GSM, WCDMA, CDMA, GPRS. Inaddition to traditional cellular networks, local area networks such asWireless Local area networks (WLAN), BlueTooth (BT) and othertechnologies such as WiMax, Broadcasting over DVB-H, ISDB-T, DMB orbroadcasting over cellular can be used. The communications network 14can also be a generic Internet access network using any data transportmethods. Moreover, the communications network 14 may be any cellular,broadcast, wide area, local area or Internet network. Communicationsnetwork 14 can also be a combination of different communicationsnetworks such as a Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) and a WidebandCode Division Multiplex (WCDMA) network.

Subscribers to the mobile telephone operator using the mobile devices 12can use the same communications network or another communicationsnetwork as the communications network 14 being used to receive credits,i.e., a hybrid network is possible.

In a preferred embodiment, the communications network 14 is a cellularnetwork and the mobile device 12 is a mobile telephone.

System 10 also includes a billing system 16 operatively coupled to thecommunications network 14 or specific parts thereof, and may be arrangedto maintain an account of available money for each mobile device.Further, billing system 16 may be arranged to monitor and/or meter usageof the communications network 14 by each mobile device 14 and monitorand/or meter usage and payments of or for the advertisements beingdelivered to each mobile device 12. The billing system 16 may be areal-time billing system or a close-to-real-time billing system. Thebilling system 16 or other suitable means associated with the system 10can thus arrange for payment from users of the mobile devices 12 basedon their usage of the communications network 14. Payment may bepre-paid, i.e. the user has paid for the service before using thecommunications network and the billing system monitors and reduces thepaid amount in the user's account based on usage. Alternatively paymentmay be post-paid and a billing system monitors usage of thecommunications network and the user pays for the services after usage.Usage of the communications network 14 may entail voice services,messaging services (Short Message Service, Multimedia Message Service,Instant Message Service, Electronic mail services), video telephonyservices, push-to-talk services, data services such as Internet orWireless Application Protocol (WAP) browsing services, content usage(television, radio, video) services, download services, premium SMS(pSMS) service, among others.

In one embodiment of the invention, billing system 16 meters usage ofthe services by each user and compares the metered usage with a free orsubsidized balance allocated to each user. In this manner, althoughinvoices are not sent to the users, the metered usage is compared withbusiness rules associated with the users and the cost for providing thefree or subsidized services to the users is invoiced directly orindirectly from advertisers. Other techniques to provide subsidized orfree telephone services to the users are also envisioned. For subsidizedtelephone services, the users may be responsible for a portion of theirusage and thus they would be interested in eliminating unnecessary useof such telephone services.

System 10 also includes a wallet service server 18 which in oneembodiment, is a computer system running the wallet service, describedbelow. Wallet service server 18 communications with the mobile devices12 via the communications network 14, and is operatively coupled to thebilling system 16.

In conjunction with the system 10, there may be one or more sponsors 20which sponsor some of the mobile service such as voice or messaging or asponsor can be an advertiser which, in exchange for sponsoring a portionof the mobile service being provided to users of the mobile devices 12,sends advertisements via communications network 14 to the users' mobiledevices (additional details of this feature are described below). Asponsor 20 may also be a party which wants to sponsor some specificpayments to users of mobile devices 12. Each sponsor 20 is provided withaccess via a computer program operating system 10 to the billing system14 and the wallet service server 18. Billing system 14 would manage thepayments from each sponsor for whatever credits or services they havesponsored.

Regardless of the nature of the sponsorship provided by sponsor(s) 20,each sponsor 20 will cause credits or services, or possibly other itemsof value, to be provided to the users' mobile devices 12. As such, itshould be understood that system 10 may be implemented to provide thecredits or services arising from sponsorship by sponsor(s) 20 to mobiledevices 12 and thus can be considered to be independent of thesponsor(s) 20, i.e., not include the sponsor(s) 20 or the mobile devices12. On the other hand, the invention also encompasses a system forenabling sponsors to sponsor delivery of credits or services, orpossibly other items of values, to users of mobile devices 12 to receivecredits or services, and this system would be inclusive of thesponsor(s) 20 and mobile devices 12.

Issuer 22 is a party which can issue vouchers, coupons or mobile creditsfor the mobile devices 12. The issuer 22 can issue the credits using anyof the techniques disclosed in International Publication No. WO2007/060451, incorporated in its entirety by reference herein. In onesuch technique, issuer 22 issues a code which is delivered to the mobiledevice 12, e.g., via the wallet service server 18 and possibly also viathe billing system 16. This code, in practice, works as a coupon whichcan be used in or by a point of sales (POS) terminal 24. The code isused in or by the POS terminal 24 to verify the amount of creditassociated with the code. Thus, the POS terminal 24 sends the code toissuer 22 so that issuer 22 can verify and provide a verificationmessage to the POS terminal 24. When a positive verification message isreceived by the POS terminal 24, the user of the mobile device 12 isgranted the value of the issued coupon for consideration by the POSterminal 24

The sponsor(s) 20 is operatively connected to the issuer 22 to enableeach sponsor 20 to authorize issuance of credits to the users' mobiledevices 12. The issuer 22 is also operatively coupled to the billingsystem 16 to coordinate payment for the credits, i.e., allocate paymentsfor the credits to the different sponsors 20. The issuer 22 is alsooperatively coupled to the wallet service server 18 to provide thecredits to the mobile devices 12.

There are several ways to use system 10 to enable a user of a mobiledevice 12 to receive and use an electronically provided credit, which isbeing considered equivalent to a voucher or coupon. In one embodiment, auser of the mobile device 12 sends a request for a credit havingmonetary value (message S1 in FIG. 1). The request can be short messageservice (SMS) message sent over communications network 14 or aMultimedia Message Service (MMS) message. The request can also be apremium SMS message with a specific monetary value sent to a specificnumber. Further, the request can be, for example, a Web or WirelessApplication Protocol (WAP) session between the wallet service server 18and the mobile device 12. In addition, the request can be generated by aspecial application running in the mobile device 12. This specialapplication can be, for example, Java, Symbian or, an applicationrunning in Subscriber Identity Module. (SIM application). Other forms ofrequests, and applications for generating such requests are alsoenvisioned.

The message S1 indicating a request for a credit having monetary valueis analyzed by the wallet service server 18. The wallet service server18 communicates with billing system 16, message S2, to determine whetherthe user of the mobile device 12 which generated the request message S1has a credit in their account maintained by the billing system 16. Thecredit in each account can be so called pre-paid credit, i.e., existingand available money, or it can be post-paid credit. For pre-paid credit,the requested amount of money is deducted from the amount in thepre-paid account. For post-paid credit, the requested amount of moneywill be invoiced later.

In the embodiment described above, the wallet service server 18communicates with the billing system 16 to ascertain whether the userrequesting credit has available credit in their account (pre-paidcredit) or the ability to draw on a line of credit (post-paid credit).In an alternative embodiment, the wallet service server 18 communicateswith the issuer 22, or even possibly with a third party such as a bankor credit card company (not shown in FIG. 1) to ascertain whether theissuer 22 or third party has an account with pre-paid or post-paidcredit for the user of the mobile device 12 requesting credit.

Regardless of which technique is used to ascertain the availability ofcredit to the user of the mobile device 12 requesting credit, when thereis sufficient credit, i.e., in the account maintained by the billingsystem 16 or by the third party such as a bank or credit card company,this causes a process of generating and delivering a code to be used toconfirm the transaction. The code is typically generated by the user 22,as in prior art techniques. In one embodiment of the invention, the codecorresponds to the monetary value of the requested credit or themonetary value of the premium SMS sent from the POS terminal 24 to thewallet service server 18. The monetary value can be less then, equal toor more than the requested amount of credit depending on possibletransaction fees and also on the existence and nature of possiblesponsors 20 of the credit request.

Once generated, the code to be used in the POS terminal 24 is deliveredto the mobile device 12 by message S3.

Once the message S3 is received by the mobile device 12, a computerprogram in the mobile device 12 can enable the user of the mobile device12 to obtain money or items, tangible or intangible, having monetaryvalue using the POS terminal 24. In one embodiment, message S3 isreadable by the user, e.g. by displaying the message to the user as atext message, and the user may use the code by entering the code at thePOS terminal using numeric keys at the POS terminal. The POS terminal 24validates the code from the user 22, for example, using prior arttechniques.

In some embodiments of the invention, the sponsor 22 may be anothersubscriber to the mobile telephone operator, such as a friend or aparent of the user of the mobile device 12. Thus, in the embodimentshown in FIG. 2, a user of mobile device 12 contains a sponsor 20, e.g.,his mother, to ask her to give him some money (message S11) in order to,for example, buy an ice cream from a shop. Alternatively, the user ofmobile device 12 may ask sponsor 20 to give him an authorization/creditto buy a certain item via message S11. The item sought to be purchasedmay be identified in message S11 using different means like an ISBNnumber of a book or as a web link to a web site having information aboutthe item (e.g., a link to a book in the Amazon.com web store), a keyword, a bar code, or a bar code number.

Upon receipt of message S11, e.g., by a mobile device of the sponsor 20,a computer program in the mobile device of the sponsor 20 would bearranged to enable the user thereof to connect with wallet serviceserver 18 to grant credit having a certain monetary value or credit forthe item for the user of the mobile device 12 (message S12). This maytake the form of an authorization to allow a certain amount of creditfrom an account maintained by the billing system 16 to be used by theuser of mobile device 12.

Identification of an item may be implemented such that the user of themobile device 12 contacts sponsor 20 by sending, for example, a MMSmessage identifying an item sought to be purchased and disclosing orotherwise providing a bar code of the item (message S11). This bar codeinformation may be then delivered to the wallet service server 18, viamessage S12, by including a picture received in the message S11 or as aSMS message containing a bar code number.

The connection between a sponsor 20 and the wallet service server 18 maybe implemented in several ways, including as a SMS, MMS, using Web/WAPinterface, or using a software application installed in the sponsor'smobile device (an application in the mobile device will then manage theconnection between the mobile device and the wallet service server 18,e.g., using SMS or a data connection). The wallet service server 18 maythen communicate with billing system 16 (as in FIG. 1) to ascertain theavailability of credit, as explained above.

After the availability of credit to the user of mobile device 12requesting such credit is checked and confirmed, the wallet serviceserver 18 notifies the user of mobile device 12 about the availablecredit (message S13), and the user can then proceed with a purchase asexplained above with reference to FIG. 1.

As shown in FIG. 3, an embodiment of the present invention alsocontemplates only indirect communications between the user of the mobiledevice 12 and a sponsor 20. In this embodiment, the user of the mobiledevice communicates with the wallet service server 18 to request credit(message S21) and the wallet service server 18 forwards as such or as amodified request to a sponsor identified in the message S21 by the userof the mobile device 12. In some embodiments, it is conceivable that theuser does not know for certain whether there will be a sponsor willingto partly or even fully sponsor the requested credit. Wallet serviceserver 22 then communicates with a sponsor 20 advising the sponsor ofthe user's request for credit and requesting a response as to whetherthe sponsor 20 is willing to provide some or all of the requested credit(message S22). If sponsor 20 agrees to provide credit, a message S23 issent by sponsor 20 to the wallet service server 18 which proceeds toissue credit to the user and notify the user of the available credit(message S24), and possibly also notify the user of the identity of thesponsor or sponsors of the credit. The available credit can be used bythe user of the mobile device in the manner described above.

In one embodiment, a sponsor 20 may be an entity or individual thatwants to advertise products or services to customers participating in amobile marketing arrangement, or an advertisement management system thatis operated by, for example, an advertising delivery company. Inexchange for providing credit to a user, the user would be required tobe exposed to one or more advertisements.

A sponsor can thus refer to a brand owner, a service provider, anadvertisement agent, a merchant or any other party that wants to provideadvertisements to consumers. Advertisements can be commercial, such as aproduct or service promotion, or non-commercial, such as a generalinformation service notification. A sponsor may also be a company in thebusiness of delivering advertisements from several advertisers, i.e., itis the intermediary between advertisers and the operators ofadvertisement distribution channels. Such a sponsor would create anadvertisement management system, which could be over an Internetinterface, and includes tools for each advertiser to define rules oftheir advertisement campaign, i.e., to enable them to tailor theadvertisement campaign to their specific desires. This may includereserving, programming and/or booking an advertising campaign via anInternet interface. Parameters which are determined include, but are notlimited to, the time period or periods when to send advertisements, theduration of the advertising campaign, the target group or groups,demographics of the target group(s), the format or type ofadvertisement, the target price level or cost per advertisement or forthe advertising campaign in its entirety, the sociological background ofthe target audience, demographics of the target group(s) including, forexample, age, sex and income level(s), target telephone type, etc. Inaddition to determining the rules, each advertiser typically providesone or more actual advertisements in the form of data, text, pictures,video, audio, html-documents, links, television content, videos, HTML,xHTML, WAP pages, web pages, etc., or any digital content compatible forreception and display by the users' mobile devices 12.

The server including or interfacing with the billing system 16, walletservice server 18 and issuer 22 may also include a database containinginformation such as profiles of the users of the mobile devices 12.Alternatively, the wallet service server 18 includes such a database. Inthis manner, each sponsor could be provided with data about each userrequesting credit (in the message from the wallet service server 18 tothe sponsor 20), determine which user or users they want to receivetheir advertisements as per their advertising campaign, and authorizecredit only for the user or users. An advertisement-supported system forproviding credit to users of mobile devices is therefore provided.

Several computer programs resident on computer-readable media may beused in the invention. One computer program is resident in a serverwhich controls or functions as the billing system 16, wallet serviceserver 18 and issuer 22, and interfaces with the mobile device 12 viathe communications network 14 and with the sponsor 20, e.g., also via acommunications network. This computer program enables users of mobiledevices to request and receive credit, possibly from one or moresponsors. In this regard, the designation of elements as a billingsystem 16, wallet service server 18 and issuer 22 are for ease ofexplanation of the invention and it is envisioned that all of theseelements can be combined in a single electronic component.

In the context of this document, computer-readable medium could be anymeans that can contain, store, communicate, propagate or transmit aprogram for use by or in connection with the method, system, apparatusor device. The computer-readable medium can be, but is not limited to(not an exhaustive list), electronic, magnetic, optical,electromagnetic, infrared, or semi-conductor propagation medium. Themedium can also be (not an exhaustive list) an electrical connectionhaving one or more wires, a portable computer diskette, a random accessmemory (RAM), a read-only memory (ROM), an erasable, programmable,read-only memory (EPROM or Flash memory), an optical fiber, and aportable compact disk read-only memory (CDROM). The medium can also bepaper or other suitable medium upon which a program is printed, as theprogram can be electronically captured, via for example, opticalscanning of the paper or other medium, then compiled, interpreted, orotherwise processed in a suitable manner, if necessary, and then storedin a computer memory. Also, a computer program or data may betransferred to another computer-readable medium by any suitable processsuch as by scanning the computer-readable medium.

One embodiment of a computer program in accordance with the inventionwhich delivers upon request credits having monetary value to a mobiledevice using a communications network is arranged to maintain an accountof available credit for the user of the mobile device (a function of thebilling system 16), receive a request for credit from the mobile device12, ascertain whether there is available credit in the accountassociated with the mobile device equal to or greater than the requestedcredit (a function of the wallet service server 18), generate anauthorization to issue credit when there is available credit in theaccount (a function of the wallet service server 18), issue credit inresponse to the authorization (a function of the issuer 22), and notifythe user of the mobile device via the communications network of theissuance of credit (a function of the wallet service server 18).

The same or a different computer program can maintain and manage bothpre-paid credit accounts which have an available balance and post-paidcredit accounts which require later payment. The computer programmanages the pre-paid account such that the account is reduced by eachamount of authorized credit.

The same or a different computer program can also enable one or moresponsors to provide available credit into the account of each user of amobile device, and also manage payments from each sponsor for creditsthey have provided.

The same or a different computer program can also issue a codeindicative of the issuance of a specific amount of credit and coordinatedelivery of the code to the mobile device. As noted above, the code canbe used by a point of sale terminal in order to verify the amount ofcredit associated with the code.

The foregoing enables innovative and focused mobile marketing andadvertising. Indeed, the popularity of mobile telephones has enabledtheir use, along with related infrastructure, as a media for providingmobile marketing, i.e., advertisements to the users of the telephones.

This is important because such a concept is considered by advertisers asthe next new channel to directly reach consumers since it utilizes coreassets and characteristics of the mobile media, namely, it is personalin that it is directed solely to individual consumers, it is “always on”and can reach the consumers whenever they access their communicationsdevices, it is mobile and naturally forms groups of people whocommunicate actively with each other. These characteristics combinedwith social networks-based approaches of the Internet could form a verypowerful base to execute marketing strategies.

In general, mobile marketing and advertising can be divided into thefollowing four categories: mobile marketing, mobile advertising, mobiledirect marketing and mobile customer relation management (CRM). Thepresent invention in any of its forms discussed above is applicable toall categories.

Mobile marketing is commonly considered as the systematic planning,implementing and control of a mix of business activities intended tobring together buyers and sellers for the mutually advantageous exchangeor transfer of products or services where the primary point of contactwith the consumer is via their mobile device.

Mobile advertising is commonly considered as the paid, public,non-personal announcement of a persuasive message by an identifiedsponsor as well as the non-personal presentation or promotion by a firmof its products to its existing customers and potential customers wheresuch communication is delivered to a mobile telephone or other mobiledevice. Examples of mobile advertising include: Wireless ApplicationProtocol (WAP) Banner ads, mobile search advertising, mobile videobumpers, and interstitial ads in or on device portals.

Mobile direct marketing is commonly considered a sales and promotiontechnique in which promotional materials are delivered individually topotential customers via the potential customer's mobile telephone orother mobile device. Examples of mobile direct marketing include thesending of Short Message Service (SMS), Multimedia Message Service (MMS)or Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) push messages, Bluetoothmessaging and other marketing to mobile telephones or other mobiledevices.

Mobile customer relation management is commonly considered as acombination of all the foregoing in a manner that establishes along-term, engaging relationship between the customer and the marketingor promoting company.

At present, mobile marketing and advertising is mostly based on pushcampaigns to opt-in a consumer mobile number in a database, or pullcampaigns that acquire mobile telephone numbers from consumers. The mosttypical example of the pull campaign is the “text-to-win” campaignwhere, e.g., a soft drink bottle contains a short code to be sent viatext message to a certain telephone number. In return, the consumerreceives a notification if they have won with the selected marketingmessage, or a series of messages is broadcast to their mobile telephone.Other popular methods of direct advertisement are achieved using textand video messaging.

Having described exemplary embodiments of the invention with referenceto the accompanying drawings, it will be appreciated that the presentinvention is not limited to those embodiments, and that various changesand modifications can be effected therein by one of ordinary skill inthe art without departing from the scope or spirit of the invention asdefined by the appended claims. For example, while it is described thata mobile phone user will initiate a request for issuance of credits, itis foreseen that the initiation of requests can come from an advertiseror sponsor, wherein after receiving the request the system checks todetermine if enough credits are present in a user's account to issuecredits to the particular user.

1. A system for issuing credits having monetary value to a mobile deviceusing a communications network, comprising: maintaining means formaintaining an account of available credit for a user of the mobiledevice, and for generating an authorization to issue credit upon requestif there is available credit in the account associated with the mobiledevice equal to or greater than the requested credit; and issuing meansoperatively coupled to said maintaining means for receivingauthorization to issue credit from said maintaining means and issuingcredits, wherein the user of the mobile device is notified via thecommunications network upon receiving notification of issuance ofcredit.
 2. The system of claim 1, wherein said means for maintaining anaccount of available credit comprises one of a billing system, a bank,or a credit card company.
 3. The system of claim 1, wherein saidmaintaining means are arranged to at least one of maintain an account ofpre-paid credit and an account of post-paid credit, and manage theaccount such that the account is reduced by each amount of authorizedcredit.
 4. The system of claim 1, further comprising deliverycoordination means comprising a wallet service server arranged todeliver credit to the mobile device, and said delivery coordinationmeans are arranged to receive a request from the mobile device forcredit and notify said maintaining means of the request for credit suchthat said maintaining means determine whether to generate anauthorization to issue credit.
 5. The system of claim 1, furthercomprising at least one mobile device selected from a group consistingof a mobile telephone, a multimedia computer, a personal digitalassistant, a laptop computer and a personal computer.
 6. The system ofclaim 1, further comprising at least one sponsor for providing credit.7. The system of claim 6, wherein at least one of: said at least onesponsor is an advertiser which provides credit for the user of themobile device in exchange for requiring the user to be exposed to anadvertisement via their mobile device, said at least one sponsor isoperatively coupled to said maintaining means and said maintaining meansmanages payments from each of said at least one sponsor for credits theyhave provided, said at least one sponsor is arranged to communicate withsaid issuing means to enable said at least one sponsor to authorizeissuance of credits to the user's mobile device, and said at least onesponsor is operatively coupled to the user's mobile device and receivesrequests for credit from the mobile device, said at least one sponsorbeing arranged to decide whether to provide credit to the requester'saccount at said maintaining means and if so, providing credit to therequester's account at said maintaining means.
 8. The system of claim 7,wherein said at least one sponsor is arranged to receive the request forcredit in association with an identification of an item sought to bepurchased by the user of the mobile device using the credit.
 9. Thesystem of claim 8, wherein the item is identified using at least one ofa bar code, key word, picture or link to a web site.
 10. The system ofclaim 6, wherein said maintaining means are arranged to await approvalfrom said at least one sponsor prior to generating the authorization toissue credit.
 11. The system of claim 1, further comprising deliverycoordination means operatively coupled to said maintaining means forcoordinating delivery of the credits, wherein said issuing means arearranged to issue a code indicative of the issuance of a specific amountof credit which is delivered via said delivery coordination means to themobile device, said code being usable by a point of sale terminal tocommunicate with said issuing means in order to verify the amount ofcredit associated with said code.
 12. A computer program resident onnon-transient computer-readable media and arranged to issue creditshaving monetary value to a mobile device using a communications network,the computer program being arranged to: maintain an account of availablecredit for a user of the mobile device; ascertain whether there isavailable credit in the account associated with the mobile device equalto or greater than a requested credit; generate an authorization toissue credit when there is available credit in the account; and issuecredit in response to the authorization.
 13. The computer program ofclaim 12, wherein the computer program is further arranged to at leastone of: maintain at least one of an account of pre-paid credit, managethe account such that the account is reduced by each amount ofauthorized credit, enable at least one sponsor to provide availablecredit into the account, manage payments from each of the at least onesponsor for credits they have provided, and issue a code indicative ofthe issuance of a specific amount of credit and coordinate delivery ofthe code to the mobile device, the code being usable by a point of saleterminal in order to verify the amount of credit associated with thecode.
 14. A method for issuing credits having monetary value to a mobiledevice using a communications network, comprising: maintaining anaccount of available credit for a user of the mobile device;ascertaining whether there is available credit in the account associatedwith the mobile device equal to or greater than a requested credit;generating an authorization to issue credit when there is availablecredit in the account; and issuing credit in response to theauthorization.
 15. The method of claim 14, wherein the step ofmaintaining an account comprises maintaining at least one of an accountof pre-paid credit and an account of post-paid credit.
 16. The method ofclaim 14, further comprising at least one of: managing the account suchthat the account is reduced by each amount of authorized credit,enabling at least one sponsor to provide available credit into theaccount, and managing payments from each of the at least one sponsor forcredits they have provided.
 17. The method of claim 16, wherein the stepof issuing credit comprises issuing credit in exchange for requiring theuser to be exposed to at least one advertisement from the at least onesponsor, and wherein the step of receiving the request for creditcomprises receiving the request at the at least one sponsor, the atleast one sponsor deciding whether to provide credit to the requester'saccount and if so, providing credit to the requester's account.
 18. Themethod of claim 17, further comprising delivering the request for creditto the at least one sponsor in association with an identification of anitem sought to be purchased using the credit, and identifying the itemusing a bar code, key word, picture or link to a web site.
 19. Themethod of claim 16, further comprising requiring approval from the atleast one sponsor prior to generating the authorization to issue credit.20. The method of claim 14, further comprising: delivering at least oneadvertisement to the mobile device; and exposing the user of the mobiledevice to the at least one advertisement in exchange for issuance ofcredit, wherein the step of issuing credit comprises issuing a codeindicative of the issuance of a specific amount of credit and deliveringthe code to the mobile device, the code being usable by a point of saleterminal in order to verify the amount of credit associated with thecode.
 21. The method of claim 20, further comprising: generating therequest for credit at the mobile device; and transmitting a request forcredit via the communications network, wherein the request is receivedvia a short message service, and wherein the request is received at awallet service server and the account is maintained in a billing system,the step of ascertaining whether there is available credit in theaccount associated with the mobile device equal to or greater than therequested credit comprising directing a request from the wallet servicecenter to the billing system to analyze the account, the authorizationto issue credit when there is available credit in the account being madeby the billing system.
 22. A system for conducting a mobile advertisingcampaign in which credits having monetary value are issued to a mobiledevice using a communications network in exchange for exposure to atleast one advertisement, comprising: maintaining means for maintainingan account of available credit for the user of the mobile device, andfor generating an authorization to issue credit upon request if there isavailable credit in the account associated with the mobile device equalto or greater than the requested credit; enabling means for enabling atleast one advertiser to provide advertisements and credit into theaccount in said maintaining means; and issuing means operatively coupledto maintaining means for receiving authorization to issue credit fromsaid maintaining means and issuing credits, wherein the user of themobile device is notified via the communications network upon receivingnotification of issuance of credit, and wherein the mobile device beingoperatively arranged to require exposure to delivered advertisements inorder to enable use of the credit.
 23. The system of claim 22, whereinsaid means for maintaining an account of available credit comprise atleast one of a billing system, a bank, or a credit card company.
 24. Thesystem of claim 22, wherein said maintaining means are arranged to atleast one of: maintain at least one of an account of pre-paid credit andan account of post-paid credit, and manage the account such that theaccount is reduced by each amount of authorized credit.
 25. The systemof claim 22, further comprising delivery coordination means whichcomprise a wallet service server arranged to deliver credit to themobile device, wherein said delivery coordination means are arranged toreceive a request from the mobile device for credit and notify saidmaintaining means of the request for credit such that said maintainingmeans determine whether to generate an authorization to issue credit.26. The system of claim 22, wherein each mobile device is selected froma group consisting of a mobile telephone, a multimedia computer, apersonal digital assistant, a laptop computer and a personal computer.27. The system of claim 22, wherein said at least one advertiser iscoupled to said maintaining means and said maintaining means managespayments from each of said at least one advertiser for credits they haveprovided, wherein said at least one advertiser is arranged tocommunicate with said issuing means to enable said at least oneadvertiser to authorize issuance of credits to the user's mobile device,and wherein said at least one advertiser is operatively coupled to theuser's mobile device and receives requests for credit from the mobiledevice, said at least one advertiser being arranged to decide whether toprovide credit to the requester's account at said maintaining means andif so, providing credit to the requester's account at said maintainingmeans.
 28. The system of claim 22, wherein said issuing means arearranged to issue a code indicative of the issuance of a specific amountof credit which is delivered via said delivery coordination means tosaid mobile device, said code being usable by a point of sale terminalto communicate with said issuing means in order to verify the amount ofcredit associated with said code.
 29. The system of claim 22, whereinsaid enabling means are arranged to provide data about the user of themobile device to said at least one advertiser to enable said at leastone advertiser to consider such data when deciding whether to providecredit to the user.